Rear Admiral SM Abul Kalam Azad took the charge of the Mongla port as Chairman on Saturday.

He replaced the previous chairman Rear Admiral Mohammad Muzammel Hoque, said a press release on Sunday.

Rear Admiral SM Abul Kalam Azad was born in on April 30 in 1967 in Kumarkhali of Kushtia. He is the son of Sheikh Osman Goni and Khadeza Begum.

He joined Bangladesh Navy on January of 1985 and was commissioned in executive brunch on July 1, 1987.

He is an alumni of Pabna Cadet College. He completed his international sub lieutenant course in Britania Royal Naval College of UK and finished his initial staff course from Royal Naval College in London.

He went to Army Language School in Istanbul of Turkey for Turkish language course and also did gunnery specialization course from Naval Training Centre in Istanbul of Turkey.

Rear Admiral Azad received numerous commendations for his outstanding performance and professional excellence in the Navy. He was awarded with the ‘Nou Gaurab Padak’ in recognition of his professional excellence and distinguished service in Bangladesh Navy.

In the wake of the outbreak of coronavirus there, the government is considering a temporary ban on travel to and from China as a precautionary measure, Health and Family Welfare Minister Zahid Maleque said on Sunday.

“The trade relations between Bangladesh and China are very deep and many people travel to China for business purposes. It might be the reason of a big loss if the deadly virus enters the country in any way,” he said while speaking at an emergency meeting at the ministry.

The minister said an inter-ministerial meeting will be held on Tuesday (Jan 28) where the issue of imposing a temporary on the travel to and from China will be considered with importance.

The emergency meeting discussed the outbreak of the coronavirus in China.

Zahid Maleque inquired about the number of affected people and the countries, and severity of the outbreak.

He also urged people not to be worried over the spread of coronavirus as the government has taken steps to prevent its outbreak in Bangladesh.

The director general of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) informed the meeting that thermal scanning is in place in all the airports, land ports and river ports of the country.

Some 56 people have so far died from the virus in China.
At the end of Saturday in China, there were 1975 cases and a further 2,684 suspected cases, China's National Health Commission said.

In the outbreak of coronavirus in China and globally, Chinese officials have restricted transport in at least 13 cities apart from the virus epicentre, Wuhan, locking down close to 56 million nationals.

The virus itself is a new or "novel" coronavirus - a family that normally affects animals.

One human variant causes the common cold, but another, Sars, killed hundreds in a major outbreak in 2003.

This new virus causes severe acute respiratory infection. Symptoms seem to start with a fever, followed by a dry cough and then, after a week, lead to shortness of breath and some patients needing hospital treatment.

There is no specific cure or vaccine for it.

BNP on Sunday briefed foreign diplomats stationed in Dhaka about the violation of election code of conduct reportedly by ruling party activists, including attacks on its candidates, and overall atmosphere of the elections to two Dhaka city corporations billed for February 1.

A group of BNP leaders, led by its secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, apprised the diplomats of the party's observations and allegations about the city polls at a meeting at BNP chairperson’s Gulshan office.

Diplomats from around 20 countries, including the USA, the UK, Germany, Australia, Canada, France, China, India, Turkey and the European Union (EU) attended the hour-long meeting that began around 4pm.

Talking to reporters after the meeting, BNP standing committee member Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury said they discussed various issues relating to the city polls and what are happening over the elections.

He alleged that the ruling party candidates are violating the election code of conduct in various ways, including setting up election camps on footpaths, but the Election Commission is not taking action in this regard.

‘There’s no level-playing field in the election. How will people get confidence in the election when the level-playing field is not ensured?” the BNP leader said.

Khosru said they informed the diplomats about the attacks on their Dhaka north city mayoral candidate Tabith Awal and south city mayoral runner Ishraque Hossain and filing of cases against them.

He said they also appraised the foreign envoys of their party’s strong reservation about the use of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) in the polls,

Another BNP leader who was present at the meeting, wishing anonymity, said Fakhrul voiced doubt about fair city elections as the ruling party men are ‘flexing muscles’ and attacking their candidates and their supporters.

He said their party also gave the diplomats some evidence on the attacks of their candidates and violation of election code of conduct by ruling party candidates.

The BNP leader said Fakhrul also voiced his dissatisfaction over the ‘biased’ role of the Election Commission, and its decision of using EVMs in the polls.

Apart from Fakhrul and Khosru, BNP standing committee members Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain, Iqbal Hasan Mahmud Tuku and chairperson's adviser Sabihuddin Ahmed were, among others, present at the meeting.

The Supreme Court on Sunday upheld its earlier order staying a High Court order for maintaining a status quo for two months on implementing the recommendations of the 9th Wage Board for journalists, clearing the way for its implementation.

A four-member Appellate Division bench, led by Chief Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain, passed the order disposing of two petitions – one filed by the Newspaper Owners’ Association of Bangladesh (Noab) and the other by the state.

It also asked the HC to dispose of a rule issued on October 15 last over the issue.

With the apex court’s order, there is no legal bar for implementation of the 9th Wage Board for journalists, said Attorney General Mahbubey Alam.

Advocate AM Amin Uddin, president of Supreme Court Lawyers’ Association, stood for Noab.

The government on January 29 last year constituted the 13-member 9th Wage Board to propose enhanced salary and other benefits for journalists and other employees of newspapers and news agencies.

Noab President Matiur Rahman filed a writ petition with the High Court on August 5 claiming that all the processes before publishing the Wage Board award were not followed properly.

On August 6, the HC bench of Justice Obaidul Hassan and Justice Mohammad Ali issued the status quo after hearing the petition.

It also issued a rule asking why the finalisation of the 9th Wage Board award without publishing recommendations of the wage board award committee in gazette notification for giving opportunity to stakeholders concerned to raise objections, if any, according to the Labour Rules 2015 and submission of the final recommendations to the government should not be declared illegal.

On August 20, the Supreme Court stayed for eight weeks the HC order, clearing the way for publication of gazette notification.

It also asked the state to file a leave-to-appeal against the HC order.

On September 10, Noab moved the apex court with a fresh application for vacating its earlier order.

Taking the advantage of the SC stay order, the government in the meantime published the gazette on September 12.

Challenging the legality of the gazette publication, the Noab president filed a supplementary petition with the HC.

After hearing the petition, the HC questioned the legality of the gazette notification.

It had also a rule asking the respondents to explain in four weeks why the gazette notification on the 9th Wage Board award would not be declared illegal.

Later, the state moved the Supreme Court.

A writ petition was filed with High Court on Sunday seeking cancellation of BNP's Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) Tabith Awal’s nomination bringing allegation of concealing  wealth information in election affidavit.

Retired judge of Appellate division AHM Shamsuddin Chowdhury Manik filed the petition with the concerned bench.

The hearing on the writ is likely to be held in the bench of Justice JBM Hasan and Justice MD Khairul Alam on Monday.

The petitioner said that the Election Commission and other concerned have been made respondents to the writ.

Earlier, the retired judge met election commissioner Md Rafiqul Islam on January 23 afternoon and demanded cancellation of Tabith’s nomination. He also submitted a written complaint.

The petitioner told  reporters on the day that ‘Tabith along two others has shares in NFM Energy (Singapore) private company limited. Tabith did not mention it in his affidavit.”

As the EC did not take any action as per his complaint, he filed the writ with the HC, said the former judge.